General / Off-Topic The EU’s obsession with Britain’s money exposes its own vulnerability

[Cosmo]

The EU’s obsession with Britain’s money exposes its own vulnerability

It has been fascinating to observe the EU’s rather curious manoeuvres as it tries to bag its last few handfuls of British cash, like a hungry chipmunk desperately scrabbling around for some last-minute nuts before it beds in for a long winter hibernation.

For an organisation which likes to think of itself in terms of lofty, high-minded ideals, it is a remarkably worldly concern which is clearly causing the most consternation in Brussels. Rather than losing sleep over the ‘four freedoms’ or ‘protecting the integrity of the single market’, it is the looming disappearance of almost 10% of the EU’s annual budget which is causing EU brows to furrow most deeply of all.

Michel Barnier’s press conference yesterday morning did not reveal a great deal that was not already known about the EU’s negotiating position. What his comments did reveal, however – particularly when he asked his audience to “imagine the political problems which might arise” should the EU have to drastically alter any of its ongoing programmes – was more about the EU’s internal concerns and insecurities. Money is very close to the top of them.

The reasons why are obvious. Facing ongoing dissent and discontent around the continent, the last thing the EU wants to have to do is tell member states that their handouts from the EU budget are going to be slashed by 10%, and that many of them may even shift from being net recipients to net contributors. A hefty lump sum from the UK would allow the EU to kick this problem into the long grass for the time being.

The EU also has fears over its various financial institutions, with specific references to the European Investment Bank, European Development Fund and European Central Bank being inserted between the first and final versions of the European Council’s negotiating guidelines. A sudden loss of British money could be a substantial blow to the health of these institutions and force further liabilities onto the main EU budget, further compounding the EU’s principal financial problem.

http://brexitcentral.com/eu-obsession-britain-money-exposes-vulnerability/

Brexit > EU [haha]

 

[FuzzySpider]

Rather than losing sleep over the ‘four freedoms’ or ‘protecting the integrity of the single market’, it is the looming disappearance of almost 10% of the EU’s annual budget which is causing EU brows to furrow most deeply of all.

Uhm. No.

They've asked for the UK to honour its financial obligations or face having no deal.

The fact the Brexiteers are throwing such a massive tantrum about this demonstrates how much of a fantasy world they dwell in. Leaving the EU means, you know, leaving the EU. The EU are offering a method to do that without causing us or themselves a whole lot of damage. The Brexiteers are demanding the EU just give them what they want.

That is the impasse. And that is the reason your food costs are rising.

 

[Boomer Kay]

The EU are offering a method to do that without causing us or themselves a whole lot of damage.

http://www.express.co.uk/news/polit...a-Merkel-Germany-pay-EU-Brexit-Liam-Fox-trade

The more the Brexiteers rile, the more likely the german tax payer will simply pick up the tab (200 billion a year trade surplus .. A YEAR .. and about 100 with EU countries - even german economists strongly suggest that we have to give that surplus back one way or another, be it direct investments or EU projects ^^) and tell them to close the door.

Also hilarious try to make the money seem the first concern of the Brexit negotiations, when the linked agenda puts:
III.1. Citizens' rights
III.2. Financial settlement

I understand the roman numbers being confusing, but please 1. Priority and 2. Priority?
The Citizens rights coming before the financial settlement?
You wonder why "the EU" gets the impression it's dealing with complete and utter imbeciles?

 

[FuzzySpider]

http://www.express.co.uk/news/polit...a-Merkel-Germany-pay-EU-Brexit-Liam-Fox-trade

The more the Brexiteers rile, the more likely the german tax payer will simply pick up the tab (200 billion a year trade surplus .. A YEAR .. and about 100 with EU countries - even german economists strongly suggest that we have to give that surplus back one way or another, be it direct investments or EU projects ^^) and tell them to close the door.

What are the chances that Germany will close to the door to UK immigrants after this? What is the public mood there towards British people?

 

[Boomer Kay]

What are the chances that Germany will close to the door to UK immigrants after this? What is the public mood there towards British people?

Germany has never and will never close it's doors on qualified immigrants.
Language barrier is pretty high, though - but not impossible.

 

[Ian Skippy]

This is what you get for selling idiots dreams. Welcome to reality, brexiters, enjoy learning you dont just get what you want because some dude said you would.

 

[Sunleader]

What are the chances that Germany will close to the door to UK immigrants after this? What is the public mood there towards British people?

Highly unlikely or rather next to Impossible.
Worst Case Scenario. The UK will be treated like any normal European Third Party State meaning that normal Immigration procedure will be Required.
Which in Short means you need to Learn the Language and get a Job. Both of which is not the easiest but also not the hardest task as the Immigration values to Germany Show.


To begin with tough that guy is an Nutcase and an well known Euroskeptic.
His idea of the EU Imploding on a Financial Level is not only very unfounded but practically impossible.
Good thing about the EUs Economic System is that it cannot really break apart.
After Greece alot of Security Mechanism were placed not only to prevent another case like this. But also to deal with it should it happen anyways.
Then again Greeces Problems were pre EU Problems which just carried over. Most Southern EU States are Profiting pretty good from the EU and are not anywhere close to breaking.

The Express spreading Interviews of Anti Euro Fanatics which want on a regular base copy Trumps Claims that the Euro and the EU will Ruin Germany are not surprising.
Neither does it surprise that this Propaganda Bot called Cosmo is immediately posting this Article here again.
Its funny how he does never actually participate in a Discussion. But constantly keeps posting Brexiteer Propaganda.


Also this is like the 3rd or 4th Brexit Topic.
Would it not be time the Mods Merged it and kept this in one Topic ?

 

[Boomer Kay]

The Express spreading Interviews of Anti Euro Fanatics which want on a regular base copy Trumps Claims that the Euro and the EU will Ruin Germany are not surprising.

Just linked the Express to show the "worst case" as envisioned by the Brexiteers. Germany will have to stand in.
100 billion EU trade surplus, 6 billion tax surplus at the end of 2016 and predicted growth in 2017 .. ok? "We" pay? So?

 

[Yaffle]

This is what you get for selling idiots dreams. Welcome to reality, brexiters, enjoy learning you dont just get what you want because some dude said you would.

Pretty much this. Remember that nice Mr Davis saying that the EU needs us more than we need the EU and it would come cap in hand to us, and agree to everything? Even that he'd cut a side deal with Germany on day 1, and that the German car makers would force Ms Merkel to grant us our every wish?

You voted for this. You've got what you voted for. Sadly we all have to endure it.

 

[beelbeebub]

The EU’s obsession with Britain’s money exposes its own vulnerability

It has been fascinating to observe the EU’s rather curious manoeuvres as it tries to bag its last few handfuls of British cash, like a hungry chipmunk desperately scrabbling around for some last-minute nuts before it beds in for a long winter hibernation.

For an organisation which likes to think of itself in terms of lofty, high-minded ideals, it is a remarkably worldly concern which is clearly causing the most consternation in Brussels. Rather than losing sleep over the ‘four freedoms’ or ‘protecting the integrity of the single market’, it is the looming disappearance of almost 10% of the EU’s annual budget which is causing EU brows to furrow most deeply of all.

Michel Barnier’s press conference yesterday morning did not reveal a great deal that was not already known about the EU’s negotiating position. What his comments did reveal, however – particularly when he asked his audience to “imagine the political problems which might arise” should the EU have to drastically alter any of its ongoing programmes – was more about the EU’s internal concerns and insecurities. Money is very close to the top of them.

The reasons why are obvious. Facing ongoing dissent and discontent around the continent, the last thing the EU wants to have to do is tell member states that their handouts from the EU budget are going to be slashed by 10%, and that many of them may even shift from being net recipients to net contributors. A hefty lump sum from the UK would allow the EU to kick this problem into the long grass for the time being.

The EU also has fears over its various financial institutions, with specific references to the European Investment Bank, European Development Fund and European Central Bank being inserted between the first and final versions of the European Council’s negotiating guidelines. A sudden loss of British money could be a substantial blow to the health of these institutions and force further liabilities onto the main EU budget, further compounding the EU’s principal financial problem.

Brexit > EU [haha]

So why are Brexitieers throwing their toys out of the pram and shouting about blackmail and election interference? They knew this was coming, yet they told you lot it wasn't.

I also think you are overestimating the impact a the UK leaving the EU would have on the other members contributions.

The net input of the UK is around the £10bn mark once the rebate (which is paid for by other states - that's right, some of that "£350 million a week" is actually paid for by France, Germany etc) and the various grants from the EU are taken into account.

Let's say that the entire UK net contribution is taken on by Germany and France who split it 50/50. That's about an extra £5bn a year extra each.

This would come out of their annual spend which is around £1250bn a year

So an extra 0.4% of spend.

Germany runs a surplus of 1.5%, so they could pay all of the UK contribution and still have money to spare and not raise taxes.

If the extra Germany has to pay (£5bn) is
.
Their government spend is already this
..........................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................
so now it will be this
...........................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................

So Germany really isn't quaking in it's boots over this. What it would do though is, in the eyes of the German public, paint the UK as the country that welched on it's obligations and left the German tax payer to pick up the tab.

Not really "hearts and minds" stuff

The reasons for the extra bits being inserted is more likely to do with the UKs attitude. If the counter party in negotiations signals that they will fight you even over the things that they know they should be paying, you tend to say "right then, if you're going to be like that, we'll throw in all the marginal items too"

 

[Boomer Kay]

http://www.politico.eu/article/eu-fires-opening-shot-to-end-londons-euro-business/

"Right now, London handles €927 billion worth of euro-denominated transactions each day"

"EU's obsession with Britain's Money".

Ha

Ha

Ha

 

[Cosmo]

http://www.politico.eu/article/eu-fires-opening-shot-to-end-londons-euro-business/

"Right now, London handles €927 billion worth of euro-denominated transactions each day"

"EU's obsession with Britain's Money".

Ha

HAHAHAH! Silly Europhile.


The EU needs British money a lot more than the other way around. It's gonna be fun to watch the EU Money Redistribution house of cards implode.

Britian will make trade deals with the whole world without years of delays and requirements of Eurocrats in Brussels.


Leaving the EU’s customs union could make us the world leader in effective trade

After losing the argument on the single market, hard line Remain campaigners quickly turned their efforts to the notion that if Britain leaves the customs union, there would be gridlock at our ports and GDP would suffer a huge fall. As with most of the claims developed by “Continuity Remainers” and delivered by the broadcast media led by the BBC, this apocalyptic prediction is complete nonsense and demonstrates that they have little knowledge of how customs procedures actually work.

The new Leave Means Leave report, Brexit and a Future UK Customs System: A Blueprint for Frictionless Trade, launched at the weekend, tears apart the myth that Dover will be clogged up when Britain leaves the customs union.

There has been so much focus on what a trade deal with the EU looks like after Britain leaves the single market that much of the mainstream media have completely ignored the fact that businesses are far more concerned about customs clearance procedures within the UK and at the border with other countries than about any potential future tariffs with the EU. The establishment of these administrative procedures is far more important than the negotiation of a EU free trade arrangement of marginal significance and something that the Government should be focusing on now.

The report sets out how Britain’s exit from the customs union is not a catastrophe, but a huge opportunity for Britain to become a more effective force for trade when we leave the European Union. Exit fits very well with a vision for a post-Brexit Britain as a truly enterprise economy and a free-trading nation.

http://brexitcentral.com/leaving-eus-customs-union-make-us-world-leader-effective-trade/

 

[FuzzySpider]

The EU needs British money a lot more than the other way around. It's gonna be fun to watch the EU Money Redistribution house of cards implode.

Thanks for that. I needed a good laugh.

 

[Cosmo]

Thanks for that. I needed a good laugh.

A good laugh at the Europhiles who can't grasp economics.


Why Brexit Is Better for Britain
.......
The Evolution of the EU

The EU is a case par excellence illustrating the failure of interventionism. To be fair, in its early stages there was something like the European idea of creating a truly free trade area: a free cross border flow of goods, labor, and capital.

This was basically achieved in the early 1990s. It brought indeed positive effects for growth and employment in basically all European nation states. But the EU’s politics didn’t stop there. It wanted to become more powerful.

In all those years the EU has been working hard to end the system of European federalism in the sense of productively competing sovereign nation states, trying to replace it by a centralized political, economic, and financial superpower in Brussels.

However, the EU’s interventionist approach has brought about a rather dismal situation as far as economic and financial matters in many EU countries are concerned: mass unemployment, public finances in disarray, and miserable growth perspectives.

The height of the EU’s fateful megalomania was the introduction of the euro in 1999: the currencies of nation states entering the European Monetary Union were replaced by a single currency, the euro, issued by a single central bank, the European Central Bank (ECB).

Right from the start, the ECB let loose a colossal debt binge, which has left broken states, banks, and consumers. To cover up the mess, the ECB has lowered rates to below zero and keeps printing money — the only options left for preventing the euro from coming crashing down.

The ECB’s policy doesn't do any good apart from covering up the problems for a while. The truth is that it causes a shortage of savings and investment, overconsumption and malinvestments on the grandest scale, thereby destroying the very pillars on which prosperity rests.

Despite the dysfunctionality of its centralization path, however, the EU is determined to pursue its current course even more radically: Its advocates a push for “Completing Europe’s Economic and Monetary Union,” basically through “closer coordination of economic policies.”

Small states are better

That said, Mises’s interventionism critique may suffice to debunk the EU approach as an economic failure through and through. However, there is another argument that deserves attention in this context. It was formulated by Leopold Kohr.

In The Breakdown of Nations (1957), Kohr points out that small states are more productive and peaceful than large states, and that virtually all political and social problems could be greatly reduced by dissolving large states into a great many small states.

Viewed against Mises’s interventionism critique, and Kohr’s insight that a super-state is the root cause of all economic and political evil, there are strong reasons for Britain to exit the EU, to steer free from an ideology that will not, that cannot, turn out to be successful.

Two Reasons Why Brexit Is Better

In fact, a Brexit would be good for at least two reasons. First, it might help to put an end to a dead-end policy as more member states may decide to opt out, thereby raising the perspective of the EU being returned to a free-market productive competition system among regions.

Second, and more fundamental, the mere debate about Brexit highlights the fact that the state (as we know it today: namely as a territorial monopolist of coercion with ultimate decision-making power) is basically always the problem, not the solution.

Today's nation state runs counter to individual freedom. It cannot be reconciled with the idea of individual freedom. The situation becomes much worse once nation states start teaming up, trying to unify their power into a single state-structure — like the EU.

In sum, there shouldn’t be any fear of a Brexit on the part of those seeking freedom and economic prosperity. On the contrary. A Brexit may hold the key to make Europe abandon a doomed course, bringing it to its senses and back onto the road of freedom and prosperity.

https://mises.org/blog/why-brexit-better-britain

 

[Yaffle]

A good laugh at the Europhiles who can't grasp economics.


Small States Are Better

That said, Mises’s interventionism critique may suffice to debunk the EU approach as an economic failure through and through. However, there is another argument that deserves attention in this context. It was formulated by Leopold Kohr.

In The Breakdown of Nations (1957), Kohr points out that small states are more productive and peaceful than large states, and that virtually all political and social problems could be greatly reduced by dissolving large states into a great many small states.

Viewed against Mises’s interventionism critique, and Kohr’s insight that a super-state is the root cause of all economic and political evil, there are strong reasons for Britain to exit the EU, to steer free from an ideology that will not, that cannot, turn out to be successful.

Two Reasons Why Brexit Is Better

In fact, a Brexit would be good for at least two reasons. First, it might help to put an end to a dead-end policy as more member states may decide to opt out, thereby raisingthe perspective of the EU being returned to a free-market productive competition system among regions.

Second, and more fundamental, the mere debate about Brexit highlights the fact that the state (as we know it today: namely as a territorial monopolist of coercion with ultimate decision-making power) is basically always the problem, not the solution.

Today's nation state runs counter to individual freedom. It cannot be reconciled with the idea of individual freedom. The situation becomes much worse once nation states start teaming up, trying to unify their power into a single state-structure — like the EU.

In sum, there shouldn’t be any fear of a Brexit on the part of those seeking freedom and economic prosperity. On the contrary. A Brexit may hold the key to make Europe abandon a doomed course, bringing it to its senses and back onto the road of freedom and prosperity.

https://mises.org/blog/why-brexit-better-britain

More concerning is those who cannot grasp reality over the EU needing the UK more than vice-versa. We reap what we sow. We are starting to reap now with increased food, decreased GDP growth, job losses, firms moving out of the UK, allies distancing themselves from us etc. This will hurt. A lot. Well played Little England, well played.

 

[Boomer Kay]

https://mises.org/blog/why-brexit-better-britain

I don't know why you keep quoting economic liberal sources.
Yes, they work.
No, they do nothing for you.

 

[ick]

The mistake wasn't Brexit, the mistake was made when joining the EU. This is simply one of many natural consequence of trying to reverse that foolish decision.

It is sort of like marrying a bossy immoral leach. Yes the divorce is COSTLY... but the mistake was saying "I do" in the first place. Not Brexit.

I remember when that was all coming to pass. I remember seeing items on the counter with the price in Euros and Finnish Markka. I was in Finland at the time. I remember clearly the pressure was HIGH for Britain to give up her Pound. THANK GOD for Black Wednesday. It was painful and costly, but it turns out all these years later that there was a silver lining. it was a blessing in disguise. Imagine if Britain was using the EURO.

Globalism is for fools and academics that think they know what is best.

No thanks.

Long live the British Pound Sterling.

 

[Sunleader]

The mistake wasn't Brexit, the mistake was made when joining the EU. This is simply one of many natural consequence of trying to reverse that foolish decision.

It is sort of like marrying a bossy immoral leach. Yes the divorce is COSTLY... but the mistake was saying "I do" in the first place. Not Brexit.

I remember when that was all coming to pass. I remember seeing items on the counter with the price in Euros and Finnish Markka. I was in Finland at the time. I remember clearly the pressure was HIGH for Britain to give up her Pound. THANK GOD for Black Wednesday. It was painful and costly, but it turns out all these years later that there was a silver lining. it was a blessing in disguise. Imagine if Britain was using the EURO.

Globalism is for fools and academics that think they know what is best.

No thanks.

Long live the British Pound Sterling.

Might not life as long given its losses lately.

The Statement that Globalism is for Fools and Academics says alot tough.
If Education and Tolerance are your Enemy and the Hope of your Life is Isolation.

Then its true that the EU is your Enemy.

- - - Updated - - -

More concerning is those who cannot grasp reality over the EU needing the UK more than vice-versa. We reap what we sow. We are starting to reap now with increased food, decreased GDP growth, job losses, firms moving out of the UK, allies distancing themselves from us etc. This will hurt. A lot. Well played Little England, well played.

Its a bit funny to be Honest.
History has shown us pretty good that Isolationism is Death of any Economy.
Yet you find people over and over who somehow make their cases of Isolationism being better than the current economic model used....

 

[Boomer Kay]

Here's a balanced view on Finland and the Euro:

http://bruegel.org/2015/12/finland-and-asymmetric-shocks/

^^

And on the Euro (or rather monetary/economic unions) in general.

http://bruegel.org/2017/03/who-would-bet-on-currency-unions-after-emu-crisis/

 

[ick]

I do not envy the position of the Finns. Such a small economy and population. How can they tolerate shock waves? GREAT place but I can't see how they won't have huge repercussions, unfortunately.